


uneven

by orphan_account



Series: until one day i had enough of this exercise of trust [1]
Category: Twilight Series - All Media Types, Twilight Series - Stephenie Meyer
Genre: Book: New Moon, F/M, First Love, Self Esteem Issues, angst angst angst, basically bella going thru her morning routine mid-zombie phase while introspecting hard, body image issues, break ups without closure, imbalanced relationship, insecurites, mentions of jacob/bella but like this isn't a romantic fic at all, tw implied eating disorder, unhealthy coping methods, unhealthy relationship dynamics
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-30
Updated: 2017-09-30
Packaged: 2019-01-07 07:15:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,116
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12228150
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: The scales were never evenly weighed, she just couldn't tell how heavily they hung in his favor until he left.





	uneven

Morning comes slowly. When she steps out of bed, it's with a heaving sigh and she is barely aware enough to flinch at the cold floor on her feet. Showering leaves her slightly more awake and slightly more aware of the inching weight becoming ever more prevalent in her waistline. Her stomach is no longer as flat as it was a few months ago when everything was still _good;_ when she didn't feel like a walking corpse. Was there a time like that, even?

Eyes on her as she chews, making her uncomfortable. _Does he really have to look at me like that? Am I eating weirdly? Do I look disgusting?_

She remembers vaguely of eventually pushing aside lunches in favor of lovely conversations spent out in the meadow. _I can eat when I get home._

But then he made himself comfortable even there. Him, sitting on her bedsheets, smiling invitingly with an opened book in hand. He'd tease her for her taste in overly romantic literature, and then read it to her anyway, as her eyes drift closed with promises of blissful sleep and pleasant dreams of him. It's never anything close to reality -- _never, ever, ever_ \-- and maybe in retrospect this is where it all began falling apart. 

She's not beautiful, not like him. 

_Is that why he left?_

Her figure, even before she began eating proper meals again, still fluctuated all the time. Her stomach would become bloated, her waist wider. Her legs were not long like Rosalie's. She wasn't petite like Alice. Doctors might say she was of average weight, normally. But what's average when you're surrounded by walking, falsely breathing supermodels? 

_Nothing, comparatively. That must be why he left._

Other boys -- the ones that have never mattered less than they do now -- tell her she's pretty, in little ways. ( _liars_.) Mike's desperation for her attention might be flattering if she'd never had the best she'll ever get, the best she could ever _hope_ for.  She knows that nothing she's ever done has left her deserving of Edward, and that's precisely why he couldn't stay; why he wouldn't, even as she was begging like a child. 

 _Pathetic_ , she tells herself, tugging on her jeans. _Begging and pleading for someone you know has no reason to care._  

So, why did he? Why did he pretend? 

Amusement? 

Perhaps living over a century could do something to a person's psyche, make them cruel. But he'd always seemed nothing short of angelic-- _impossible._ He'd held her at one time like she was the most important thing he'd ever touched, and to think that none of it was real would break her irreparably. She can't, she won't. If it means deluding herself, she'll accept it. She has to believe that _some_ of it was real and not just conjured up in her mind. 

It's funny that she might be the only one to think so, these days. 

The girls at school -- the ones who'd never mattered before, but seem to get under her skin now more so than ever -- are different than the boys who have given up on gaining her attention. Angela is fairly sympathetic but only for so long. It's been months of playing pretend pseudo-zombie-human and she can tell that even her most saintly friend is growing tired, perhaps bored, of it. Jessica seems vindicated, if Bella's allowing herself petty thoughts. Edward Cullen never wanted anyone -- _her_ \-- so it only makes sense that he'd toss the plain Swan girl aside, too. It was inevitable. 

Their comments -- snide and hidden behind palms, whispered in the halls and in-between lunch lines -- shouldn't bother her anymore than the words ' _I don't want you_ ,' should. Back in Phoenix she'd been bullied plenty for her pale skin but she'd never paid much mind to it. Now when girls like Lauren Mallory make comments on her weight gain, or sickly appearance, she feels a sense of anxiety that is brand new. It makes her chew her nails; a habit she'd thought she'd done away with in middle school. It makes her tug at her long hair, attempting to cover her surely agonized expressions from their piercing eyes. She doesn't want to feel like this, _she never has before._

Is this what it is? Life before and after Edward Cullen? Is she destined to remain hanging somewhere in the void of _what was_ and _what could've been._..? 

Can she even survive like this? 

...Does she even _want_ to? 

 _No,_ Bella quashes the thought almost as soon as it appears. There are people to think of, people who she cannot afford to break the way she's been broken. Charlie, for one, who still cannot make spaghetti because he forgets to stir. And Renee -- sweet, absent-minded Renee -- who still writes checks that bounce and leaves the front door unlocked because shutting out the world invites negative vibrations. She loves her parents, though love is sort of a null emotion for her right now. She can pretend. For them. She has to. She will.

And then there's Jacob. 

Jacob who still tries to draw smiles out of her -- _sometimes_ succeeding. Those small victories are becoming more often these days. Her jaw hurts whenever it does, and when he makes her laugh, her voice sounds raw and wrong from prolonged disuse. He feeds her gas station candy bars and daily doses of sunshine. He doesn't seem to mind that for the most part she's unresponsive, unwilling to give as much as she receives-- he's much like Mike, and the others in that respect -- _Bella Swan can do no wrong_. (but she still couldn't keep the one thing she really, really could not afford to lose.) She wonders briefly what he'd think if he knew that when he grabs her hand, or puts an arm around her, she imagines him with much, much colder skin. 

Would he hate her and leave? 

Would that be _better_? 

If she were kind, she'd tell him to leave her alone for both their sakes. But she is numb, not kind, and she sometimes likes smiling again.

Combing through her hair with a paddle brush, she stares at herself in the mirror. The circles under her eyes are deeper, darker, more prominent than ever. Against her pale complexion, it makes her look near ghoulish. Though her cheeks are less sunken in, having filled out these past few weeks, and she _almost_ looks human again. Or close to it, at least. Her eyes don't look quite so dead either. 

Her lips twitch, she tries for a smile -- but it's twisted, gnarled. Without Jacob to draw it out of her, or Charlie's mopey face to inspire her to fake it convincingly, it's hopeless. 

 

**Author's Note:**

> it's the year 2017 and i'm trying to make New Moon Bella sympathetic god help me


End file.
